The dish on Solomonov and Cook’s 3 new restaurants: K’Far, Merkaz, and Laser Wolf
They're planning an all-day bakery/cafe in Rittenhouse, an all-day sandwich shop in Washington Square West, and a dinner house in Kensington.
Michael Solomonov and Steve Cook are on a bit of an empire-building streak in 2019, with three Israeli-inflected restaurant projects in the works.
First to open, and teed up for early July, is K’Far, an all-day bakery and cafe that will be part of the residential entrance of the Harper, the new 25-story apartment tower on 19th Street between Sansom and Chestnut Streets.
Star here will be Camille Cogswell, the CookNSolo pastry chef at Zahav, who won the James Beard Award last year for rising star chef. K’Far is Hebrew for “village."
Now for the other two, which had only been in the rumor stage.
They’re going to a project by the Goldenberg Group in the 1200 block of Sansom Street. It’s the new building next door to the venerable watering hole Fergie’s Pub and it will be what’s been described to me as an all-day sandwich shop named Merkaz (as in “central place”). Target there is September.
And finally, their rep confirms my report from last August that they are planning a Zahav-ish grill at 1301 N. Howard St. in Kensington. It’ll be called Laser Wolf, reminiscent of the butcher from Fiddler on the Roof (whose name is traditionally spelled “Lazar”). Laser Wolf is scheduled for the end of the year with Andrew Henshaw, current chef de cuisine at Zahav, as executive chef.
Besides Zahav, CookNSolo operates Abe Fisher, Dizengoff, Goldie, The Rooster, and Federal Donuts.
Critic Craig LaBan will have more on philly.com Friday and in Sunday’s Inquirer.